The new anti-Semitism, and the campaign to silence American critics of Israel

Despite many assaults, past and present, the First Amendment of the United States constitution broadly guarantees freedom of speech. But it is threatened by a slanderous campaign to discredit or silence American critics of the Israeli government. The Israel lobby, guided by the Israeli government, with the help of Israeli think tanks, is organizing this effort. In fact, Malcolm Hoenlein, the Executive Vice Chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, has publicly announced this campaign for the 2013-14 school year.

A key component of this attack on freedom of speech is the “new anti-Semitism,” the claim that criticism of Israel is based on hatred of Jews. But the real purpose of the new anti-Semitism is to discredit and silence Israel’s critics in the U.S. and elsewhere, even though comparable criticisms are common place in Israel, especially in such renown newspapers as Ha’aretz, the “New York Times of Israel. “

A recent victim of this smear is Sadia Saifuddin, the University of California student recently appointed without any opposing votes as the first Muslim student representative to the University of California Board of Regents. Even though Ms. Saifuddin is clearly qualified, with a great resume, Israel lobby stalwarts StandwithUs, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and David Horowitz attacked her nomination. Why? Not because Saifuddin was unqualified. It is because she has opposed the Israeli government’s occupation of the territories it conquered in 1967, including the resulting dispossession of Palestinian property and violation of Palestinian human rights guaranteed through international law. For these reasons she cosponsored a divestment resolution at the UC Berkeley Student Senate, and the AIPAC types — using the template of the new anti-Semitism — then claimed she was unfit to be a UC Regent because she threatened UC Jewish students

Indeed, Jewish students and faculty were once victims of real anti-Semitism on American campuses from the early 20th Century through the early 1970s in the form of admission quotas, glass ceilings on high academic and administrative positions, and discriminatory practices by fraternities and sororities. But these types of anti-Semitic social discrimination were successfully fought and have been absent from American college campuses for over 40 years. In fact, Jewish organizations, such as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) no longer measure anti-Semitic discrimination in the United States. This is why the ADL’s annual count of anti-Semitic incidents is restricted to verbal harassment, assaults, and property crimes, none of which have the slightest connection to Sadia Saifuddin.

With hardly any real anti-Semitism in sight, the Israel lobby concocted a new form of anti-Semitism: criticism of the Israeli government’s policies and practices. They argue that any criticism of Israel is really a call for the destruction of the state, the alleged secret agenda of the country’s critics. Nonsense! And the Israel lobby knows this is nonsense because nearly all American critics of Israel are driven by opposition to a nominally Western country that – on one hand – “shares our values,” while – on the other hand – has maintained a 46-year military occupation over four million people in conquered territories, depriving them of human, civil, and economic rights. Furthermore, in blatant violation of the 1949 4th Geneva Convention, Israel continues to construct illegal towns, cities, and factories in these areas. These segregated “settlements”, including their access highways, are limited to Jewish Israelis. Furthermore, these settlers are subject to Israeli civilian law, not the Israeli military law imposed on their immediate Palestinian neighbors.

Another case of the new anti-Semitism targeting speech on California campuses is California State Assembly Resolution HR-35. HR-35 characterizes any criticism of Israel as “cloaked” anti-Semitism. Carlos Villarreal, director of the San Francisco chapter of the National Lawyers Guild, called this resolution irresponsible and dangerous because it fails to distinguish between legitimate support for the Palestinian people and real anti-Semitism (i.e., verbal harassment and physical attacks on Jewish individuals and institutions). This is why the ADL does not include these campus political events in its annual list of anti-Semitic activity in the United States.

HR-35 did not become California law, but it has had the effect of encouraging university administrators to enact restrictions on campus political events critical of the Israeli government. Under an HR-35 inspired campus policy, some political speech would be silenced. Any person or group that stood up against an obvious human rights abuse, like Israel’s 2008-09 assault on Gaza with banned phosphorus bombs, could be charged with anti-Semitism. These bogus charges could ruin someone’s reputation and bring sanctions against university-affiliated student organizations. Most individuals and campus groups would, therefore, remain silent. After all, who wants to be identified and then punished as a bigot?

The intent of HR-35 is to undermine free speech when that speech entails criticism of Israel.

So what happens next? California is about to witness a major effort by the Israel lobby, financially supported and directed by the government of Israel, to discredit campus groups that work for the end of Israel’s direct and indirect occupation of the land it conquered in 1967. As active members of LA Jews for Peace, we strongly oppose this misuse of charges of anti-Semitism, and stand with those, Jewish and non-Jewish, who criticize the practices of the Israeli government and the support of those practices by the United States government. Attempts to muzzle groups for political speech should be stopped in the bud.

Jeff Warner and Dick Platkin are Jewish peace activists in southern California and leaders of LA Jews for Peace. They have organized many demonstrations against Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory in general and the siege of Gaza in particular. Warner has been on humanitarian missions to Gaza. He is a retired research geologist and now works on environmental and climate change issues. Platkin is a retired city planner and now works to stop “mansionization” of residential neighborhoods.

About Jeff Warner

Jeff Warner is a Jewish peace activist in Los Angeles. He is active in LA Jews for Peace, Jews for Peace Between Israelis and Palestinians, Americans for Peace Now, and Cousins Club of Orange County. He organized street demonstrations against the Israeli siege of Gaza since late 2007, and against the Israeli bombardment of Gaza during the December-January massacre. Warner is a retired geologist.

Jews were never victims of anti-Semitism on campuses in the 70’s, 60’s, or probably the 50’s either. Just a ridiculous statement. In fact, there were no real quotas affecting Jewish students during these years– there were attempts at lots of elite universities to make them more nationally focused universities, by taking students from the other 40 states of the union, not huddled around the Northeast corridor. That is, there was positive discrimination for kids from the states that people in the Northeast have always hated (Alabama, Arkansas, Texas, Oklahoma, etc), and as a result, many Jews living in the Northeast complained that this was pro-Christian discrimination or anti-Jewish discrimination in the same way that whites currently complain about affirmative action.

There was and is only one true religious discrimination that has gone on at this country’s elite universities and that is anti-Catholic discrimination, and Jewish professors and students as well as Protestant profs and students have done their part to stoke the flames against Catholicism and Catholics from the late 19th century to the present. More recently there is a fervent anti-Muslim fervor among lots of atheists and Jewish profs at elite universities– the same type of people that are anti-Catholic are often equally anti-Muslim.

Madrid, similar point I made below. And I do not know why the authors rolled that old dog out in their essay. Either they have an interest in keeping the untrue meme alive or they have been brainwashed to believe it and keep on repeating it. I think the latter.

I think it was Galbraith who said that is is still and always PC in America to be completely anti Catholic.

All that is really besides the point — and so what — as what I wonder is why it seems there is a celebration, even a nurturing of ideas of anti Jewish in history as a part of Jewish identity? What other group does that? And why would any group do so?

How often do we hear what is really a narcissistic claim “we’ve been persecuted for 2000 years?”

There is some Endogeneity to the problem of discrimination, if you bias the selection of tests, you can mask detection of outright bias: Declarations of discrimination can then be merely psychological projection:

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“Earlier we had noted that the tests used to select NMS semifinalists actually tilted substantially against Asian students by double-weighting verbal skills and excluding visuospatial ability, but in the case of Jews this same testing-bias has exactly the opposite impact. Jewish ability tends to be exceptionally strong in its verbal component and mediocre at best in the visuospatial,57 so the NMS semifinalist selection methodology would seem ideally designed to absolutely maximize the number of high-scoring Jews compared to other whites or (especially) East Asians. Thus, the number of high-ability Jews we are finding should be regarded as an extreme upper bound to a more neutrally-derived total….

Putnam Exam winners had averaged about two white Gentiles for every Jew, with the ratios for each decade oscillating between 1.5 and 3.0, then rising to nearly 5-to-1 during 2001–2005, and without a single Jewish name on the winner list from 2006 onward.

This seems like a factual question which someone ought to be able to answer–was there discrimination in colleges against Jews as late as the early 70’s? I was initially surprised it could have survived to that late date, but I don’t know–certainly black Americans faced much worse discrimination right through the middle 60’s. I don’t think the authors of the post simply made this up.

The Jewish virtual library has a short article on discrimination against Jews at Harvard, which lasted from the early 20’s to the late 30’s. Part of the motivation was anti-semitism, or pandering to the anti-semitism of students (which isn’t quite how the Harvard official put it), while part of it seems to have been a desire for geographical diversity–sort of an affirmative action program for rural white Christians from North Dakota, so to speak. This is what Madrid mentioned, but from what the jewishvirtuallibrary says there was also anti-semitism at work. I see no reason to doubt it.

Um, everyone does it. Claiming victim status gives you the moral high ground, or that’s how it’s supposed to work. I think this goes back to the days when Christians bragged about their martyrs, first by pagans and later by other Christians (Fox’s Book of the Martyrs comes to mind) and it hasn’t stopped. American Christians have about as little to complain about as any group in history–just some ridicule by secularists in Hollywood sometimes–and evangelicals sometimes talk like mass persecution is just around the corner. Every group that has suffered anything claims victim status, some with more justification than others. Even white males in the US get into the act sometimes. Whether the attempt to grab moral high ground is justified is just something one has to figure out on a case-by-case basis.

“Um, everyone does it. ” No, not at all. As for the rest of your post, it is too banal and ridiculous to respond to, but briefly.

There are many groups/individuals/ethnic identities who no not narcissisticly (sic) shroud themselves as victims, fearful of the other and build a colonial enterprises based on the ideas of victimology. That is, after all, essentially weak and pathetic.

I’ve mentioned this before: I witnessed Muslin women in the Balkans removing a plaque placed in the memory of the horrific rapes and killings in a sports stadium. This was not the self identity they wanted to cultivate and nurture.

As for the Christian fear about mass persecution right around the corner: can you source such claims?

Your problem, and the problem of most educated Americans, is that they know relatively little about the history of religion in the west or in the US. A review of that history shows that most of the charges of American anti-Semitism at elite American universities, while certainly valid in some cases, were exaggerated.

Here are a few salient facts about the history of religious elites in England and the US after the seventeenth century that should make things clearer:

1. After 1649, when the Puritans and the Levellers got control of England, the country became very philo-Semitic, something which did not change with the restoration of the king in 1660. It wasn’t solely evidenced by Cromwell allowing free immigration of Dutch and German Jews. It was also that the Puritans thought of themselves as the New Jews– the new Chosen nation. This was caused partly by the Erastian political theories that had begun in the earlier century, but it was also due to the new focus on the Old Testament by the Puritans, rather than the New Testament. The Puritans also viewed their own “anti-idolatry” tenets and their Bibliophilic nature as something that was similar to Judaism’s reverence for scripture and iconoklastic approach to idol-worship as well as antithetical to Catholic reverence for saints and Catholic icons.

2. During this period and later, it was often said by English and American Protestants of all denominations that it was far more important to fight the Catholics than the Jews or the Muslims. Indeed, even Queen Elizabeth had tried to establish strong diplomatic relations with the Sultan of the Ottoman empire, at a time when Europe was seriously threatened with wholesale invasion by the Ottomans. This is because Anti-papism was a fundamental aspect of Protestantism (and still is to some degree). In other words, it was similar to the trinity or belief in Christ’s resurrection. It was a basic requirement of being a good protestant, and thus expression of anti-papism became a fundamental aspect of the religion. This never occurred with anti-Semitism– in fact, many Puritan sects tried early on to emulate the Jewish prohibition on eating pork, for example, while everything to do with Catholic traditions was to be rejected.

3. The reason why English and American Protestants discriminated against Catholics is that they considered the Pope to be another temporal ruler, which he was to a certain extent– he governed the papal states, supposedly from the time of Constantine’s Donation. And they thought that Catholics recognition of the Pope meant that Catholics were ipso facto traitors to the country. At least before the state of Israel was founded, there was no evidence of Jewish dual loyalty for American Protestants, so there was no reason to make accusations of dual loyalty during the first 5 decades of the 20th century.

So while, yes, there was certainly anti-Semitism, Jews were accepted in the historically Protestant universities of the Northeast well before Catholics were accepted at those places. A good example of how serious anti-Catholicism was at the university level is the contempt that the University of Notre Dame encountered, when Knute Rockne tried to lobby for ND to join the Big Ten conference. Even though Notre Dame had rivalries with several of the Big Ten schools, administrators at Michigan and Chicago said very publicly that in no uncertain terms would there ever be a Catholic school in the Big Ten. There never has been such outward hostility to any other religion in the US, including Judaism, with the exception of recent hostility towards Islam.

“No, not at all. As for the rest of your post, it is too banal and ridiculous to respond to, but briefly.”

I didn’t expect that sort of nastiness, but perhaps you are so sure of yourself the arrogance just comes spilling out. It’s astonishing that you’ve not heard people say anything about this before. Banal, yes, because it’s obvious, except maybe in your world where only, it seems, one particular group uses past discrimination in current political arguments. I see men complain about feminists, feminists complain about men, whites complain about blacks, evangelicals complaining about gays (I literally heard this last night). Somehow you must have missed the whole Zimmerman/Martin thing. Claiming victimhood and making fun of people claiming victimhood has been part of US politics for decades.

“As for the Christian fear about mass persecution right around the corner: can you source such claims?”

Yet another link, Ellen. Maybe you should reconsider why you would have ever thought that self-dramatization and imagined victimhood was the property of one particular group, when evidence contradicting this was all around you. I suppose you somehow missed how some of the opponents of gay marriage see themselves as victims.

One final one–this from a conservative Christian blogger (Michael Spencer) who died of cancer some years ago, but started to become critical of his subculture. He was fairly well known on the evangelical internet. This post is from 2007. Note that he takes for granted the fact that American evangelicals harbor delusions of being persecuted–

Donald, my point was that not “everyone does it.” Even if that were true, in no way does it minimize the self centered, and ultimately weak, manipulative tactics of cultivating victimology for gain. Working up claims of “new anti semitism” is an example of just that.

While you give current examples of a similar (but not the same) being done by self identified groups — feminists, gays, some evangelical Christians, you do point it out as wrong and delusional. And so is the politics of a phony “new antisemitism. ” (Or Judeophobia, more correctly.) And not one of those self identified groups has as much influence in government and policy as Zionists in the USA.

Your attempt was to minimize the manipulative nurturing of ideas of new antisemitism.

And you continue to do that with links, for example, to the utterings of an aging Evagelical fringe internet character or the sometimes qustionable identity politics of gays and feminists.

The dishonest diversion of “everyone does it” to minimize and distract from the truth at hand is abbhorent. That made me angry, and I do apologize if it came across as an attack of you. It is an attack of the argument and dishonest methods.

Madrid you are simply wrong about this. Yale for example had a Jewish quota that was completely distinct from its regional preferences. The record is clear and documented in books like “Joining the Club.” Penn on the other hand did not have the same quotas and it is one reason why it was considered a “lesser Ivy.”

My father and other people of his generation experienced institutional prejudice “why should we give a seat to a Jew?” he was asked during his interview, as well as having had stones thrown at him as a kid while being called a “Christ Killer.” His neighborhood was Jewish bordering on a rough white ethnic area.

1) This in no way mitigates the fact that African Americans and Native Americans had it far worse in every way.
2) This in no way says anything about Israel or Palestine.

I didn’t and don’t deny that Anti-semitism existed in the US or that it was not serious in many cases. I denied that it was very serious at American elite universities from the 50s on, and I also noted that before the 50’s, it was nothing like the Anti-Catholic prejudice that has historically existed at American universities and does exist to this day.

I didn’t say anything about African or Native Americans– I was under the impression that we were discussion religious prejudice not racial prejudice.

tokyobk, Madrid is absolutely correct and you give a diversion based on heresay. But your account of your father’s experience he must have shared with you, perhaps indicates the cultural nuturing of victimology. (Just as the erroneous statements on restrictions to education for Jews in the above article.)

When a child I wanted to invite a girl in my class over. She was not allowed to come to our home because we were a Catholic family. And Catholics did bad things and the Nuns wore black, she told me, because they killed their babies. I was hurt, but in a kid way, felt sorry for her and what her home must be like.

That was not an ugly (and hurtful) experience I would ever share with my children. Why should they feel that, and to what purpose? It is not a reality or world-view to adopt, to pass on to children. And I cannot imagine they have experienced anything like that. It does not exists anymore and died it’s own death without something like the ADL.

A chilling example of Israel’s manipulation of a foreign country’s laws to stifle truth and free speech. Big Brother incarnate. They have no shame, no respect for democracy or diversity, and a gangster-like presumption that they can run US internal laws and policies to suit themselves and suppress any dissent. What US legislator can look the US public in the eye and not be utterly humiliated at the occupation of their own country by anti-democratic snatch squads sent from Israel?

”Attempts to muzzle groups for political speech should be stopped in the bud. ”

Only way to stop it is to ignore the Zio orgs intimation and keep on trucking.
And some lawsuits against the individuals and orgs who try to slander activist as
a-semites.
I would love to see a really good case on this get all the way to the US Supreme court and challenge the Zio, and the US government if necessary, on the correct definition of Anti-Semitism. Destroy the sloshing around about what ‘hidden’ anti semitism ‘could be’ or ‘might be’ in criticism of Israel or any other ‘real poltic’ issue.
I notice none of the zio bots here have accused any of us who have been criticizing the countries of Egypt and Saudi of being anti Arab or Muslim bigots–why should it be any different for Israel.

An important commentary. Thank you. Yet it is also possible that the greater and disingenuous use of the “Anti Semite ” card the more meaningless and it becomes as a tool to silence. And that is when the real Judeophobes come out. (Anti Semite is a strange and wrong term for Judeophobia — after all it was coined by a real Judeophobe to describe Jews as Semites. ) But they will always be among us, just as racists and ignorance will always be with us.

Another thing, can you back up this meme: Indeed, Jewish students and faculty were once victims of real anti-Semitism on American campuses from the early 20th Century through the early 1970s in the form of admission quotas, glass ceilings on high academic and administrative positions, and discriminatory practices by fraternities and sororities. with facts or data?

What schools had such quotas 40 years ago? Glass ceilings? Exactly where? For some of us who remember 40 years ago (and it seems these authors do not) that claim does not match experience. As an aside — which in itself does not matter anyway but… — there were Jews admitted to Harvard and Yale long before any Catholics were allowed.

There were cities that had Synagogues long before a Catholic Church could ever be built — i.e. Charleston.

Do we cry about anti Catholicism? Of course not as it is past or irrelevant.

Point is, beating the drum of past institutionalized Judeophobia in America — and it was just as among others –only feeds the justification of fears of a “new anti antisemitism.”

To describe the type of lobbying AIPAC currently manages and the money behind it is anti-Semitic because in describing what is actually happening now old tropes about Jewish influence are recycled.
It is very dangerous, the whole mess.

seafoid says: “To describe the type of lobbying AIPAC currently manages and the money behind it is anti-Semitic because in describing what is actually happening now old tropes about Jewish influence are recycled.”

It’s these Hasbara clowns which actually recycle this tropes and spread antisemitism. Like antisemites condem Jews as such, Jewish supremacists and philosemites are just the other racist extreme: ‘Jews as such can’t do wrong. Critizism can only be (cloaked) hatred.’
This attitude plays right into the hand of antisemites.

“Yet it is also possible that the greater and disingenuous use of the “Anti Semite ” card the more meaningless and it becomes as a tool to silence. And that is when the real Judeophobes come out…But they will always be among us, just as racists and ignorance will always be with us.”

I disagree. In fact I think this notion, that anti-Semitism is an eternal phenomenon, helps feed into this phony Zionist discourse.

Prejudices can, for all intents and purposes, disappear over time. It’s difficult for people today in the West to remember how virulent anti-Catholicism was in Protestant nations, and only Northern Ireland in our time has served as a reminder. For centuries following the Reformation the divide between Protestant and Catholic was as bitter as that between Christian and Jew. But it can be almost categorically said that traditional Protestant anti-Catholicism is dead.

The same can be said for old-fashioned prejudices against white immigrant groups in America from Ireland, Italy, Poland, etc. In the period of afterglow of WASP prejudice against white “ethnics”, people still made jokes about these groups. But even this brand of ethnic humor has all but vanished. When was the last time you heard a joke making fun of Poles?

The list goes on. In the 19th century anti-Chinese racism was far more bitter and violent than anything Jews faced in American history, and comparable to what they faced in Eastern Europe during the period. Today it’s an historical curiosity. Only older people remember jokes about Chinamen and Chinese laundromats.

There’s no reason anti-Semitism couldn’t largely disappear as well. In point of fact, it already has in the U.S. and Western Europe. Which is precisely why we should stop being defensive about it when condemning Israel’s crimes and the lies of its lobby.

I have a Catholic friend, yes a friend, who refers to ‘bloody Prods’ and asked why Protestants are better buried than cremated, the answer being that ‘deep down, we can be quite nice’. Eek. On the other hand I think he’s quite nice both deep down and on the surface.
He has a right to prefer Catholic doctrine and to that extent to be anti-Protestant. For my part I much prefer Protestant aesthetics and find that the great European Catholic Cathedrals are excessively decorated to the point of discomfort. There’s room for legitimate disagreement and it’s absolutely wrong for our views on religion, often the least rationalised of all our opinions, to demand to be respected and placed beyond all critique. On the other hand Ellen’s absolutely right to say that eternal cherishing of grievances is unbalancing to the mind.

RE: Another case of the new anti-Semitism targeting speech on California campuses is California State Assembly Resolution HR-35. HR-35 characterizes any criticism of Israel as “cloaked” anti-Semitism… HR-35 did not become California law, but it has had the effect of encouraging university administrators to enact restrictions on campus political events critical of the Israeli government… ~ Jeff Warner & Dick Platkin

MY COMMENT: This Zionist suppression of free speech is yet another reason I fear that Revisionist Zionism and Likudnik Israel (specifically by virtue of their inordinate sway over the U.S.) might very well be an “existential threat” to the values of The Enlightenment [like the “right of free speech” and the “freedom of association”]! ! !“Down, down, down we [the U.S.] go into the deep, dark abyss; hand in hand with Israel.”

How can Zionists not see how shortsighted their conflation of criticism of Israel and anti-semitism is? Most people I know (and that’s mostly people with only minimal knowledge of I/P although in Australia thinking the Palestinians have had the sharp end is uncontroversial) just roll their eyes when they hear accusations of anti-semitism now. That’s not a good thing.

If it’s not upgraded or improved everyso often, the punters will just move on to a new brand of bigotry, by a rival race/religion/ethnicity/etc! Can’t have that, how will they play the all too necessary victim card?!
Hence:

“Deputy Foreign Minister Zeev Elkin said this week the demand that Israel freeze construction in East Jerusalem and the West Bank is anti-Semitic.”

RE: “Indeed, Jewish students and faculty were once victims of real anti-Semitism on American campuses from the early 20th Century through the early 1970s in the form of admission quotas, glass ceilings on high academic and administrative positions, and discriminatory practices by fraternities and sororities.”

I attended junior colleges, then urban University, then Law school in the midwest (while working full time a good part of the time in a steel mill) from 1964 to the end of 1971, and there was no discrimination or even sentiment against Jews I ever experienced or heard about from my Jewish friends during the course of my academic trek. I don’t know why they said this was so. I bet the writers didn’t even attend higher education at the time. Anybody know?

A key component of this attack on freedom of speech is the “new anti-Semitism,” the claim that criticism of Israel is based on hatred of Jews. But the real purpose of the new anti-Semitism is to discredit and silence Israel’s critics in the U.S.

An Israeli official challenged American Jewish College youth today to combat anti-Israel propagandas on the campus, “much of it old anti-Semitism in new dress.” Moshe Yegar, Consul General of Israel in Philadelphia, said that such propaganda was being disseminated at colleges and universities across the country “by pro-Arab and certain radical groups.” Mr. Yegar addressed 225 students at the B’nai B’rith Hillel Foundation’s annual summer institute at Camp B’nai B’rith here. He claimed that anti-Israel propaganda had grown in vehemence and scope since the 1967 Six-Day War and that it “constitutes a danger to both the interests of Israel and those of the Jewish people.”
…
A week-long Hillel workshop at Camp B’nai B’rith on Israel and American Jewry has been formulating programs to counter anti-Israel propaganda when the students return to their campuses next month.

Any criticism of Israel = destruction of Israel is just total hooey and dangerous hooey at that. Trying to get a person, group of people or the country of Israel based on the 67 border to reign themselves in before they destroy the very idea and the country they love is constructive…not destruction. Constructive….

The role of Political Zionism in the disintegration of the Middle East

What defines modern-day, Political Zionism? It is a worldwide, essentially secular, political and social movement comprising a group of people with a common ideology whose goals are the development of the state of Israel and the enhancement of its position in both regional and world affairs. The majority of its supporters are Jewish, but not exclusively so.

But that definition omits any mention of the fulcrum upon which the state of Israeli precariously balances. That is the United States of America – or rather, the United States Congress that is affiliated to the government of Israel in so far as all its members are vetted by AIPAC, the American Zionist lobby, to ensure that, as far as possible, they are all committed to its political agenda.

As a lobbying group, AIPAC acts solely in the interests of a minority political faction within the United States that actively supports the state of Israel and is, therefore, not representative of the American electorate as a whole although it would be fair to say that it has, in general terms, a sympathetic audience on both the East and West coasts and in the Bible Belt of Middle America. But this latter is a religious Zionism that has little, if any, commonality with Zionism of the political stripe.

However, it is arguable fact that Americans tend to easily absorb the political propaganda that portrays Israel as a beleaguered nation that ‘doeth only good and sinneth not’: which is somehow essential to the security of the United States on the other side of the world and which is allegedly threatened with total extinction by its Muslim Arab neighbours.

The truth is more prosaic but infinitely more disturbing. The state of Israel is the only secret nuclear weapons state in the world with an arsenal estimated to contain more nuclear war heads than either France or Britain notwithstanding that it is less than one tenth the size of either country. Furthermore, it is reported to now have a fleet of submarines, inexplicably supplied by the German government, and now reportedly converted to being nuclear-armed and secretly patrolling the Mediterranean and the Gulf.

Israel, of course, is a non-signatory to the nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty and is completely outside the inspection of the IAEA, thanks to the US concocted trick of ‘nuclear ambiguity’. Nor has Israel ever ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention to which the US and the EU are signatories.

But what has this to do with the Middle East, in general, and the current dangerous instability, in particular? The answer is complex but the clues are to be found in the facts above.

As a consequence of the influence of AIPAC upon American politics and specifically upon US foreign policy in the Middle East and elsewhere, it is clear that the Israeli government works through its lobby in Washington to achieve its political agenda. That agenda requires Israel to be the only regional, nuclear power and to ensure that none of its neighbours are ever allowed to challenge its military supremacy. The job of AIPAC is to ensure complete compliance with this agenda even if this entails sending American troops to attack Iran, Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Pakistan or Libya or any state in the Middle East notwithstanding that there is no direct threat to US security.

However, any perceived threat to the American economy is an entirely different matter. In 1953, the CIA implemented a coup to overthrow the popular, democratically elected Iranian government headed by Prime Minister Dr Mosaddeq and to replace him with its own nominee, Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran. The far-reaching consequences of that illegal and illegitimate act of political violence, are now history – a history that is integral to the current instability in the Middle East. Now the US and Israel act in concert for their mutual advantage that is too often to the detriment of the Middle East and the world. And this has become more and more obvious as each year passes and each political situation that is influenced by billions of American dollars paid either overtly in ‘aid’ or covertly from slush funds. Hosni Mubarak, the deposed Egyptian dictator was paid billions of dollars each year to stay in bed with Binyamin Netanyahu in order to maintain a pseudo peace with Israel and a blockade of essential supplies to 1.6 million in Gaza, for over five years, that still exists today courtesy of American ‘aid’.

The foregoing is but a snapshot of America’s complex and covert involvement, often in collusion with Israel, in the politics and conflicts of the Middle East – conflicts that are likely to determine the course of the 21st century and the world in which we all live. The current chemical weapon atrocity in Syria is but another alarming indication of events to come.

It seems that everyone agrees here so let me try to explain those who are like me not only disagree but are honestly thinking that the authors of this opus are digging a grave for the Jews in US. The clear examples are already seen in Europe and France where the anti-Zionism is clearly leading to open and violent anti-Semitism.
The logic is this – it started with opposition to the way Israel treated and treats Palestinians. Legitimate democratic actions. Then (via BDS, blogs like this one and much more) it moved to anti-Zionism. This is already a very drastic step. Why? Because great majority of Israelis are Zionists. Politically all the parties in the Knesset declare themselves Zionists APART of three Arab parties (which by the way represent only half of non Jewish population only 10% out of 20%) . So- anti Zionism is effectively to be against a state of Israel. At this point for those who haven’t it is instructive to listen to Norman. Finkelstein interview o BDS and such organizations

Finkelstein (who can not be suspected in loving Israel) realized that BDS effectively should lead to the destruction of Israel. Not just to the first item below – “improving Israel’s record on Palestinians” but to its destruction. And that was not what he wanted.

But he thinks that the movement has to exploit the existing public and international law consensus behind the two state solution in order to gain mass appeal or accomplish its main objectives.

In my opinion he is mistaken in claiming that international law doesn’t have anything to say about the human rights of the Palestinians citizens of Israel. It actually does. Their rights were placed under UN guarantee by the minority protection plan contained in resolution 181(II) and those customary rights can’t be modified without the consent of the General Assembly of the United Nations. I think the General Assembly should simply stop accepting Israel’s credentials and refuse to permit it to participate in the business of the UN, until it complies with the terms of that plan and its other Charter obligations.

Finkelstein thinks it is unrealistic and cult-like thinking to believe Zionists will negotiate a settlement that would alter the existing Jewish demographic balance and accept millions of exiled Palestinians. That’s a fair assessment of Zionist attitudes, and the odds of that ever happening. But if granting equal human rights to others would destroy Israel, why shouldn’t Palestinians insist that it join other failed or dysfunctional entities like Southern Rhodesia and the Union of South Africa on the scrap heap of history? Its cult-like thinking on the part of Zionists to believe that Palestinians or the international community will get worn down and accept or settle for an undemocratic Jewish state between the River and the Sea.

hello fn, i just wanted you to know with plenty of time to rectify the issue, we did receive your many pleas to publish pt 2 section of your comment. however, it occurs to me no one found your space aliens argument compelling enough to publish. if you’re going to critique mondoweiss to convince us we’re anti semites i would urge to get more fact based. sorry. otherwise it just sounds like an ad hominem rant w/some aliens thrown in to support your theory.

edit:or brevity might work, shorter fn: “if space aliens zoomed into earth and came to MW they’d agree w/me this is an anti semitic blog” but seriously how many paragraphs do you need to say that?

Perhaps the author’s argument is that anti-semites are not anti-Israel because Israel is somewhere for the Jews to go away from; countries with a majority non Jewish population that have an anti-semitic legacy like Germany, Poland, Hungary, UK, France, Spain etc.

In which case the pro-Israels who invented the new anti-semitism are pretending the anti-semites are anti-Israel when in actual fact the anti-semites are pro-Israel?

Not sure that adds up. Isn’t it more likely that the real anti-semites are those who claim that all criticism of Israel is devoid of anti-semitism? Or those who may like to claim that there isn’t now or hasn’t been a certain level of anti-semitism?

“the “new anti-Semitism,” the claim that criticism of Israel is based on hatred of Jews. But the real purpose of the new anti-Semitism is to discredit and silence Israel’s critics”

If that isn’t what the article is arguing, like I said, then why is my supposition based on an appeal to my ignorance and fallibility, bearing in mind the article’s argument claims that the new anti-semitism has nothing to do with anti-semitism?

Look at their example and what HR35 actually says.

“HR-35 characterizes any criticism of Israel as “cloaked” anti-Semitism.”

“…anti-Semitism exists on some college campuses and is often cloaked as criticism of Israel”

If the argument of the article were correct and all criticism of Israel was free of anti-semitism then the Bill would be a limitation of free speech and the new anti-semitism not a form of anti-semitism.

As this argument is incorrect then my admittedly tongue in cheek and ridiculous conclusion

“In which case the pro-Israels who invented the new anti-semitism are pretending the anti-semites are anti-Israel when in actual fact the anti-semites are pro-Israel?”

is sound, within the article’s argument that is. I would have thought this shows the author’s infallibility and ignorance, not mine.

Do you think that criticism of Israel could ever be cloaked anti-semitism? Validate yourself and give me a straight answer Hostage.

“HR-35 characterizes any criticism of Israel as “cloaked” anti-Semitism.”

Correct. HR-35 was rejected by the California Regents because it violates the 1st Amendment. The fact is, that in nearly every decade, the Supreme Court handles two or three cases involving examples of state and federal lawmakers doing that very thing.

Here is an example where the lawmakers overstepped and implied that speakers calling for ICC investigations and prosecutions of the Israeli officials responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including the establishment of illegal Jewish-only settlements, the crime of persecution, and the crime of apartheid are somehow engaging in anti-Semitism:

WHEREAS, Over the last decade some Jewish students on public postsecondary education institution campuses in California have experienced the following: . . . (2) speakers, films, and exhibits sponsored by student, faculty, and community groups that engage in anti-Semitic discourse or use anti-Semitic imagery and language to falsely describe Israel, Zionists, and Jews, including that Israel is a racist, apartheid, or Nazi state, that Israel is guilty of heinous crimes against humanity such as ethnic cleansing and genocide, that the Jewish state should be destroyed, that violence against Jews is justified, that Jews exaggerate the Holocaust as a tool of Zionist propaganda, and that Jews in America wield excessive power over American foreign policy;

I’d also note that the 1st and 14th Amendments to our Constitution prevent the Jewish people from exercising their right of self-determination on US territory, by either establishing a Jewish State here or conducting a war of secession. It can hardly be anti-Semitic for Palestinians to adopt the same view expressed in an April 20, 1964 letter to Rabbi Elmer Berger of the American Council for Judaism from Assistant Secretary Phillips Talbot of the U.S. State Department, which confirmed that the US government

“does not recognize a legal-political relationship based upon religious identification of American citizens. It does not in any way discriminate among American citizens upon the basis of religion or ethnicity. Accordingly, it should be clear that the Department of State does not regard the “Jewish people” concept as a concept of international law.”

— See Whiteman’s Digest of International Law, Volume 8, U.S. Dept. of State, U.S. Govt. Print. Office, 1967, page 35

Zionists speakers routinely say that violence against Palestinians is justified and compare other ethnic groups to Nazis, when they claim that Jews still need a safe haven in Israel from genocidal Gentiles living everywhere else in the world. Zionists also use exactly the same theories of territorial aggrandizement and conquest employed by the Nazis to justify annexation of Palestinian territory.

As well as not answering my question, “Do you think that criticism of Israel could ever be cloaked anti-semitism? “…

…you’re also being sneaky in the placement of your quotes.

“Look at their example and what HR35 actually says.”

“HR-35 characterizes any criticism of Israel as “cloaked” anti-Semitism.”

“Correct. HR-35 was rejected by the California Regents because it violates the 1st Amendment.”

The less eagle eyed reader may well believe that HR35 states that any criticism of Israel is anti-semitic. HR35 doesn’t, even though the article claims the opposite and you playing around with quotes for the gallery can be made to seem to concur.

The less eagle eyed reader may well believe that HR35 states that any criticism of Israel is anti-semitic.

I already pointed out that it does exactly that if you criticize Israeli apartheid, ethnic cleansing, or other crimes against humanity. There is nothing sneaky about this quote:

WHEREAS, Over the last decade some Jewish students on public postsecondary education institution campuses in California have experienced the following: . . . (2) speakers, films, and exhibits sponsored by student, faculty, and community groups that engage in anti-Semitic discourse or use anti-Semitic imagery and language to falsely describe Israel, Zionists, and Jews, including that Israel is a racist, apartheid, or Nazi state, that Israel is guilty of heinous crimes against humanity such as ethnic cleansing and genocide, that the Jewish state should be destroyed, that violence against Jews is justified, that Jews exaggerate the Holocaust as a tool of Zionist propaganda, and that Jews in America wield excessive power over American foreign policy;

If you have not put the same amount of effort into other conflicts in other parts of the world, then you know that criticizing Israel is the new antisemitism. You know this is true when the vast majority of those criticizing Israel have not been active with other issues.

giladg “If you have not put the same amount of effort into other conflicts in other parts of the world, then you know that criticizing Israel is the new antisemitism. You know this is true when the vast majority of those criticizing Israel have not been active with other issues”

“You know this” how?

Lead me to your name on discussions for these other conflicts buddy, we’ll show ’em

BTW if we join you on these discussions will Israel suddenly start adhering to the law, UN Charter, conventions?

“If you have not put the same amount of effort into other conflicts in other parts of the world, then you know that criticizing Israel is the new antisemitism.”

Then you know that antisemitism is no longer a bad thing at all, but merely a label for a person who properly criticises the israeli state. So now when the craven babies in the ADL start whining about this and that person is an antisemite, I no longer have to actually pay attention to what the person did or said, I can just simply dismiss it as being nothing at all…

What rubbish giladg!
Our governmnets are aiding and abetting the Israeli criminal enterprise to a greater extent and over a longer time – decades – than any other conflict in the world, and yet the situation for the Palestinian people has only got worse. Which is a powerful enough reason to focus there. Consider that the support for dictatorships in the region over the same timespan has only enabled Israel’s crimes to continue unabated, as democratic expression has been suppressed deliberately. Consider that Israeli ‘Clean Break’ and US PNAC only came about after the Kuwait invasion, ie after Saddam chucked a few Scuds at Israel. And how many $trillions have they ended up costing our countries? What’s antisemitic about wanting to see justice, an end to Israeli madness?

If you have not put the same amount of effort into other conflicts in other parts of the world, then you know that criticizing Israel is the new antisemitism. You know this is true when the vast majority of those criticizing Israel have not been active with other issues.

Just out of curiosity, why should anti-Zionist Jews pour our efforts into conflicts we know nothing about, and ignore the fact that many of us have family histories full of terror, harassment, or outright extortion perpetrated by gangs of Zionist thugs, or of being ripped-off by the “get rich quick schemes” hatched by Zionist colonial agents? For many Jews, the Zionist movement was always synonymous with a cottage industry or syndicate of organizations engaged in corruption and racketeering. If you “follow the money” poured into the settlement enterprise, it still is.

My own grandparents grew-up in failed colonies where the superintendent used price tag tactics of vandalizing or repossessing farm equipment and destroying crops to keep the members in line.

When he and his comrades finally went to Palestine, they helped found a trade union there that operated as “a state within the state” with its own armed militias and industries that were involved in corruption, protection rackets, assassinations, bombings, and other acts of terror. The only thing that distinguishes him from gangsters like Jimmy Hoffa is that he acquired a degree of sovereignty through his life of crime, conquest, and ethnic cleansing.

Didn’t your grandparents sell their land to the farmer’s natural enemy, the cattlemen?

No stupid, the Zionist’s Superintendent was vandalizing farming equipment and destroying the crops of Jewish homesteaders before they ever had an opportunity to sell their private property to anyone else.

Frankly your feeble attempt to supply a rationalization for flagrantly abusive and even criminal behavior just proves my point about the nature of Zionists and their political movement. You still are a bunch of venal *ssholes.

‘No stupid, the Zionist’s Superintendent was vandalizing farming equipment and destroying the crops of Jewish homesteaders before they ever had an opportunity to sell their private property to anyone else.’….Hostage

Hostage..where did this happen……Palestine in the early years or elsewhere… and why was it being done?….to take over their property by running their crops? Can you elaborate.

‘The colonists did not get along with Baum and by 1884, many of them had given up farming and started working for the railroad. Those that remained farmers leased parts of their land to a company that was promoting cattle trails. The HUAS was very angry that the farmers did this, and Baum was ordered to take away all the farming implements. The settlers, who had thought the implements had been given to them permanently, found out that they were given to them on a loan basis’

Do you have any data to back up this claim: “the vast majority of those criticizing Israel have not been active with other issues.” While learning about the historic injustice perpetrated against the Palestinian people may be an introduction to activism for some young people, many other critics of Israel have been involved in a variety of peace and justice issues for years before becoming advocates for Palestinian human rights. That certainly is the case with the majority of activists I know. We’ve done anti-nukes, we’ve done El Salvador, we’ve done South Africa, we’ve done GLBT rights and many other causes. Palestine’s moment has finally come — those who are aware are not giving up and the movement is growing. Get used to it.

I agree with James that the I/P problem deserves more attention rather than less, more concentration. I know of nothing remotely like Zionism either in its astonishing lack of justification nor in its massive support within the Western world. So I concentrate quite a lot on stating my opposition to it, in which my admiration of the many Jewish people who oppose it, perhaps paying a social price I don’t pay, is implicit. Let me say it’s also heartfelt.

>> If you have not put the same amount of effort into other conflicts in other parts of the world, then you know that criticizing Israel is the new antisemitism. You know this is true when the vast majority of those criticizing Israel have not been active with other issues.

And if you have not put the same amount of effort into defending other oppressive and supremacist states, then you know that defending the oppressive and supremacist “Jewish State” is the new anti-Gentilism. You know this is true when none of the Zio-supremacists defending the oppressive and supremacist “Jewish State” has defended oppressive and supremacist states elsewhere.

I don’t think that all criticism of Israel is Anti-Semitism. Anti-Zionism is not synonymous with Anti-Semitism. That said, the points where Anti-Zionism and Anti-Semitism do converge should not be ignored .

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